During the June session of the Connecticut Leadership Academy, the fellows focused on creating environments which encourage others, fostering collective visions for the future, developing trust and building strong, committed teams within their organizations.

The fellows spent this session at LeadingAge Connecticut and visited Elim Park in Cheshire on the second day for a tour and a discussion over lunch with the Elim Park management team.  Thank you to Ron Dischinger, Zell Gaston and the entire staff and residents of Elim Park for your hospitality!

Learning to be an effective team leader involves an understanding of team dynamics, individual styles, knowing your strengths and weaknesses, achieving consensus and knowing decision making techniques.

In this session the Leadership Academy fellows explored vulnerability and how to break their traditional mental models thru particular tools and practices.  One such tool is the Six Thinking Hats system designed by Edward de Bono.  Six Thinking Hats is a tool for group discussion and individual thinking involving six colored hats which reflect six different modes of thinking:  

• Blue - Managing
    What is the subject? What are we thinking about? What is the goal? Look at the big picture.
• White - Information
    Considering purely what information is available.  What are the facts?
• Red - Emotions
    Intuitive or instinctive gut reactions or statements of emotional feeling 
• Black - Discernment
   Logic applied to identifying reasons to be cautious and conservative. Practical, realistic.
• Yellow - Optimistic response
   Logic applied to identifying benefits, seeking harmony. Sees the brighter, sunny side of  situations.
• Green - Creativity 
   Statements of provocation and investigation, seeing where a thought goes. Thinks creatively,  outside the box.

The Leadership Academy fellows were provided with a situation and assigned their own "hat" to wear.  They had to act out the personality of the hat a nd to try to come to a group consensus on what to do with the assigned situation.  It was a very eye opening experience for them.

The Leaders in Residence event has become one of the favorite activities in the Leadership Academy.  It is designed to bring leaders from the field of aging services together with the Leadership Academy fellows so they have an opportunity for small group, intimate dialogue. Leaders are selected who are able to shed light and their personal perspective on a topic represented by the theme of the session.  They are asked to consider a set of three questions, answering each briefly and then opening themselves up to questions from the fellows.  

Many thanks to Hilde Sager from Masonicare, Bill Fairbairn from New Samaritan Corporation, Anne McCarty from the Alzheimer's Resource Center and Karen Buckley from the Connecticut Hospital Association for participating.